A Collection of Three
by Evadne
Summary: Three vignettes produced from a challenge in my Livejournal.  Stars Dinah and Vincent, with brief visits from the rest of the Bizengang.
1. A House of Cards

(Author's Note: I may be one of the first people able to say this, but this is written with complete permission from the author. I do not, however, have permission from the publisher, so, Bizenghast belongs to M. Alice LeGrow and TokyoPop. These three vignettes were written as a challenge on my Livejournal.)

**A House of Cards with a Foundation of Stone**

Vincent had told Dinah to be at his house at 4:30. If she stayed for three hours, and left promptly at 7:30, she would have half an hour of summer sun left to get home before darkness fell and her mad visions came on. Assuming that she took the quickest path through the woods, went full tilt on her bicycle through town, and did not apply the brakes while going down the hill on Blair Road.

Before she met Vincent, Dinah knew she would not have been brave enough to do that. Of course, if she hadn't met Vincent, there would be no reason for her to do that.

She was on time, but there was little else for her to do these days but be on time. Vincent's parents' house (he repeatedly insisted that it was theirs, not his) was an imposing mansion from a time when not just anyone could afford to have a mansion. Set far back on a goodly piece of land, it looked deserted, though not particularly creepy, to Dinah as she came up the driveway. To be fair, it _was_ mostly deserted, as Vincent lived in the garden behind the house.

Walking her bicycle behind the house, she found Vincent on the stone patio, apparently building a gigantic house of cards. Her breath froze in her chest; she was suddenly paralyzed by the idea that her slightest movement would bring the entire creation down.

"Hi, Dinah," said Vincent, standing up and swinging his limbs around as if he were unaware of fragile buildings he threatened. "I'm glad you could make it past your aunt today."

"What are you doing?" Dinah whispered, trying to create as little breeze as possible.

"Oh, I'm building a card castle for my friend Peter. He's using it for a photo shoot." Vincent casually touched a tall tower of cards.

"Don't!" cried Dinah. But nothing happened. The card towered remained steady, and the still queens and kings stared blankly on, mocking her overreaction.

"Huh?" said Vincent. "Oh, I'm taping them together. It'd hardly stay up for a minute otherwise."

"That's cheating!" said Dinah, feeling something shockingly akin to panic bloom in her breast. "Card houses are not supposed to stay up for more than a minute. They're delicate, and useless, and too difficult for most people! Why not build a house out of sturdier materials instead?"

"Dinah, it's a prop for some pictures, not a philosophical dissertation on the fleetingness of security." Vincent smiled reassuringly and reached out his hand to Dinah. "Besides, why shouldn't something fragile be given a little support now and then? Now, come on. Help me finish this, and we'll take a walk out by the bridge."


	2. Who Wants to See The Future?

**Who Wants to See the Future?**

THUNK! Vincent dropped the handsaw and grabbed the suddenly tottering table. "Stop it, Edaniel," he said. "I won't be able to cut this hole if you keep running into the table."

"Take off the fishbowl, Edaniel. It's unbalancing you," advised Dinah.

"I can't," said Edaniel. "I'm Commander Keen. The atmosphere on your planet may kill me."

Dinah sighed and lifted the fishbowl off Edaniel's head. "You'll be wearing it all afternoon," she said, putting it aside. "Vincent, how big of a hole should I cut in the tablecloth?"

"I'm making the hole in the table about six inches. You can fit through that, right, Edaniel?"

"I can fit through holes of any size, Valentine," said Edaniel proudly.

Dinah smiled, and quickly snipped a hole in the center of the tablecloth. The darkened tent was almost ready for the start of the school fair. The carefully painted sign outside read "Madam Dianora's Fortune Telling," and a diaphanous wall of fabric shielded those inside from curious on-lookers. On the inside of the tent, Dinah had hung a fancy astrology chart and few blowups of tarot cards. All that was left was the _pièce de résistance_: the draped table with the "crystal ball" centerpiece.

"Are you sure you're ready for this, Dinah?" asked Vincent, finishing with the table and dusting off a few wood chips. "The kids at school already think you're strange. They're full of crap, of course, but this probably isn't going to help that opinion."

Dinah was silent a moment as she lay the tablecloth over the table and made sure the holes lined up. "This is what I want," she said finally. "They're not really full of crap, Vincent. I _am_ strange. But if they think _this_ is the kind of strange I am, it will go easier when I start school again."

Dinah set the fishbowl over the hole. "Okay, Edaniel. Let's see how it looks."

Edaniel skittered under the table and a few seconds later, his head popped up in the fishbowl. "Hang on," he said. "Turn down some of those lights, and let me get the flashlight on."

Vincent turned off the work lights they'd been using, and Edaniel turned the flashlight on under his face. It really didn't do much to highlight his mostly flat features, but a bright green cat in a fishbowl was eerie enough. "I've come from the world BEYOND to tell you your FUTURE!" he said.

Dinah and Vincent laughed. "All right, Madam Dianora," said Vincent. "Put on your veil and we should be ready to open shop."

Covering her head and eyes, Dinah made herself comfortable on a plush cushion on the far side of the table. Vincent squatted down on the other side. "I want to be your first customer," he said. "Read my palm?"

Dinah took Vincent's hand in her own, opening his fingers and studying the palm intently. "You have a strong heart line, Vincent," she started, tracing it with her finger.

"Use your spooky voice," said Edaniel from the center of the table. "Your spoooOOOoooky voice."

"It cuts straight across your palm," Dinah continued, ignoring him. "It means you care deeply about others. It even dips through your head line, here. That means that sometimes you make emotional decisions when you should make rational ones. You put yourself in danger when you don't have to."

Vincent leaned a little closer, presumably to see where Dinah was pointing, but she caught him peeking under her hooded veil. She blushed, and glanced back down at his hand. "That's odd," she said.

"What's odd?" asked Vincent, who was obviously no longer looking at his own hand.

"There's a gap in your life line. It just stops and then starts again a few millimeters away."

"What does that mean?"

"I have no idea." Dinah dropped his hand, puzzled and suddenly nonplussed. "Maybe we should let some customers in now, Vincent."


	3. PreRequisite Harry Potter Crossover

**The Pre-Requisite Harry Potter Crossover Fic**

As the giant, three-headed dog reared up over her, it occurred to Dinah that she had never encountered a ghost who had set up so many damn death traps. One major death trap, or two or three minor ones, was par for the course. But so far they had fled a dragon on flying broomsticks, crossed a pond full of floating dead bodies, and Edrear had hacked the head off of what had appeared to be a giant snake. The worst by far, however, had been the tall, black draped figures that had tried to corner them. The endless chill that had filled Dinah had been worse than going insane. Luckily, Edrear's quick thinking had saved them, and he'd collapsed the wall on top of some, and blocked the way to the rest.

Of course, it had also blocked the four of them in with the three-headed dog.

"Nice doggy," said Edaniel. One of the dogs' heads barked echoingly and chomped at him. "Well," he said, wiping off some dog saliva, "there goes my chance to strike a blow for dog/violently-lime-green-cat-monster relations."

"Edaniel, keep distracting that head!" commanded Edrear. "Miss Dinah, Vincent, you two keep another head busy. I'll start hacking them off while they're paying attention to you!"

"No!" said Dinah. "You can't solve everything by cutting its heads off. I don't think it's trying to kill us. Look, it's standing on a trap door!"

"That's great," said Vincent, "but it still won't let us get close. How do we get by, then?"

"Maybe the flute I picked up from the graveyard outside," said Dinah, putting the flute to her mouth. At the first few tentative notes, the dog began to calm down.

"Huh. Soothes the savage beast, and all that jazz," said Edaniel.

As the dog lay down on the floor, Edrear pulled open the trap door. "Let's go," he said, and disappeared into the darkness below. Edaniel and Vincent followed quickly. Still playing as best she could, Dinah backed slowly to trap door before turning suddenly and jumping in.

She could see nothing as she fell, and could hear nothing but the whistling of wind as it went past her head. With a sudden jolt, she landed on a hard, stone floor. "Ahhh! Ow," she said.

"Dinah!" Vincent appeared out of the darkness at her shoulder. "Are you okay?"

"Yes, but where are we?"

"Some kind of storeroom," said Edaniel, winding from between Vincent's legs. "A storeroom for glass balls."

Looking around, Dinah could see Edaniel was correct. Around her was shelf after shelf of dusty glass balls. Leaning in close, she could read names on them, but it made no immediate sense to her. "I wonder what they are?" she asked.

"It doesn't matter," said Edrear shortly. "No one has tried to kill us yet, but we need to be on guard."

In a tight group, the four of them crept down the narrow aisles between shelves. There was no sound, no sign of any living or dead thing but themselves.

A sharp noise like a sob pulled Dinah up short. Pulling ahead of the others, she rounded a corner and found a girl, no older than 13, clutching one of the balls and crying. "What happened?" asked the ghost.

"I…I don't know," said Dinah.

The others came around the corner behind her and stared at the ghost. "What happened?" the girl said again, plaintively.

"Oh," said Vincent. "That makes sense." He stepped away from the others to stand next to Dinah. He then addressed the ghost: "They find and destroy the Horcruxes, while spending a lot of time in the woods. Harry dies, but comes back to life again. Pretty much half the rest of the cast dies, but doesn't come back. Snape is a good guy with a lifelong crush on Lily. Voldemort is an idiot. Neville is awesome and Luna is awesome, but her dad not so much. Um…oh, and Dumbledore's gay."

"I knew it!" cried the ghost, as a burst of white light took her to her final rest.


End file.
